The Skeleton King (Dartmoor Book 3)

by Gilley, Lauren

~*~

  Aidan scrubbed at his chin in silent frustration and surveyed the interior of the Briar Hall maintenance shed. There were two ancient Snapper mowers, a push mower, an aerator, spreader, and a tangle of garden tools. The place smelled like rotted grass and mold. Pallets of seed, fertilizer, and mulch took up the far wall. And beneath a tarp, he finally found a shiny green John Deere lawn tractor, which appeared to be the largest mower around.

  A necessity, since he was going to mow this goddamn place.

  His initial reaction to Walsh’s comment about a groundskeeper had been to give the guy the mental finger. Stepping up didn’t involve sinking to new lows in his book.

  But then had come that night in Tonya’s apartment, and he’d tasted her mouth, and felt her wet and tight around him, and his priorities had begun to shake out.

  He hadn’t found a groundskeeper yet, and the grass around this place was getting bad shaggy, so he was going to mow the lawns himself.

  He yanked the tarp the rest of the way off, coughed at the dust it stirred up, turned to throw it over his shoulder –

  “Shit!” He snatched it back just in time, barely avoiding Walsh’s old lady. He’d almost thrown the nasty thing over her like a shroud. “Damn, I didn’t see you.”

  Emmie swiped a hand through the glittering dust cloud and shook her head. “Just walked in. What are you doing?”

  “I’m gonna mow.”

  She stepped deeper into the shed, the sunlight behind her flaring around the halo of her bright hair. “You’re serious? Did Walsh put you up to it? Did you lose some kind of bet?”

  He checked the face he wanted to make. She was somebody’s woman, even if he wanted to react to her the same way he would Ava. She threw off that sister vibe for him. “Nah. It needs doing, so I’m gonna do it.”

  She tipped her head to the side, studying him. “Are you just trying to impress Tonya, ‘cause no offense, but she’s not going to be into the whole yard man thing.”

  He smirked. “I already impressed Tonya enough, trust me.”

  “Ew.”

  “I just…look, do you not want me to or something?”

  “No. Please, that would be awesome. It needs cutting badly and Fred shouldn’t have to.”

  Right. Because a horse groom was too good to put his ass on a lawnmower. “Too cliché for him?” he asked.

  “He’s got more important stuff to take care of.”

  “Gee thanks. I feel so valuable.”

  She shook her head, face scrunching up like she was mad at herself. It was cute enough to dispel some of his temper. “Okay, I didn’t mean it like that. I meant Fred has prior commitments, and our clients will be pissed if he doesn’t fulfill them. It would be wonderful if you mowed the grass, Aidan. Please.” She threw in a cheesy grin that he couldn’t help but find charming.

  He nodded. “Yeah. But just this once. Until I can find you a guy to do it all the time.”

  “Deal.”

  So that was how ten minutes later, the son of the Lean Dogs president, and the city’s most sought-after bad boy chick magnet, ended up puttering alongside a horse arena on a bright green John Deere lawn tractor. He was pretty sure his balls were trying to crawl up inside his body.

  And that was before Tonya spotted him.

  She was walking her horse down to the arena, and paused to inch her sunglasses down and examine him over the tops of them, mouth curling up in disgust.

  He cut off the mower. “Hey.”

  “What the hell are you doing?” she asked.

  He flashed her his patented shark smile and spread his arms to encompass the mower and the acres of barnyard lawn around them. “What’s it look like?”

  “It looks like you’re…mowing the grass.” She might as well have said eating the grass, for the total disdain in her tone.

  “It’s my day off at the shop, and I thought I’d help out around here,” he said proudly. Women loved that – doing extra work, taking responsibility.

  But Tonya didn’t look impressed. “Emmie’s supposed to hire someone to do that.”

  “I’m looking for a groundkeeper,” he said, less proudly this time. “But until I find one, I thought…”

  She turned away from him mid-sentence, leading her horse through the arena gate. “Wash the grass smell off yourself before you pick me up later. I don’t have gardener fantasies, Aidan.”

  Thirty-Three

  “Tomorrow?” Emmie followed Walsh into the bedroom, trying not to let the sinking sensation in her stomach bleed into her voice. “For how long?”

  He started undoing the buttons on his denim shirt – she’d thought at first it was the same shirt, then realized he had four identical shirts while she was doing the laundry – and shrugged. “Couple days there, couple days back, maybe three days layover. Long as it takes to…” His face twitched. “Conduct business.”

  The business part wasn’t what bothered her. This was a purely emotional reaction on her part, and she wasn’t going to do a good job hiding it. “Why didn’t you tell me sooner?”

  He shrugged out of the shirt and tossed it on the hamper, started in on his belt. “Just found out this afternoon when I saw Ghost. Texas needs to step up the timeline, and since I can’t very well tell them no after this” – gesture to the room around them, the house, the farm – “I’ve got to head out in the morning.”

  All the way to Texas. She thought she must feel exactly like an anxious wife. “You’re not traveling alone, are you?”

  He gave her a little smirk as he ditched his jeans. “Worried about me?”

  “Um, yeah! You don’t need to be riding halfway across the country by yourself. What if something happens to your bike? What if you get attacked?”

  “Attacked?”

  “Well I don’t know how many enemies you have. It could be like a bad eighties movie out there.”

  He laughed.

  “Walsh–”

  He stepped up and took her gently by the arms. “Love, I’m not going alone,” he said, sobering. “There’s a whole group of us going, with a truck, in case something happens to a bike. I’ll be fine. The trick will be you not getting into some kind of massive trouble while I’m gone.”

  “I am not a troublemaker.”

  “Beg to differ.” He kissed her and stepped back. “I’ve got to shower ‘fore we go.”

  “Go where?”

  “Oh.” He paused on his way to the bathroom. “Club party tonight. A send-off before we go tomorrow.”

  “Club party.” Her chest tightened. “And what does that entail, exactly?”

  He grinned. “Guess you’ll find out.”

  ~*~

  Aidan caught his reflection in the frosted elevator doors, and noted his vicious expression. He looked like his father: brows drawn low, jaw set, eyes bright and dark like an animal’s. A hungry predator, one that was tired of being treated like a Golden retriever.

  He hated Tonya’s building, he decided, as the elevator arrived and dropped him into a terrazzo hallway identical to the one on the first floor. Everything spoke of restraint, from the clean lines of the wall sconces to the exact angles of the apartment numbers, to the walls the color of eggshells. Someone else might have called it masculine. Tasteful. Expensive. He called it pretentious and douchey. He’d grown up in rooms crowded with furniture, full of warmth, laugher, and color. What must Tonya think of his skin, if she lived someplace like this? All his ink, his roses, the scars on his forearms where the tats had been power-sanded off by the asphalt.

  He rapped loudly on her door when he reached it, drawing a disapproving glare from a passing resident. He stared the guy down until he looked away.

  The door opened and out rolled a cloud of subtle, high dollar perfume. Tonya braced a hand in the open doorframe and angled her body in a way that showed off her lithe figure, tonight wrapped in second-skin green silk.

  “Hi,” she greeted in a low purr.

  The picture she made did everything for him physically: the
fuck-me shoes, the glittering jewelry, the glossy coiffed hair, the perfect makeup.

  But Aidan had a coldness in his gut. He’d thought this was a strong woman, self-possessed, driven, who knew what she wanted. He’d thought she might be a little like Mags, that quasi-sister stepmother female figure who reigned supreme among his ideal thoughts of women.

  He’d thought wrong, though. This was an expensive bitch who liked to fuck bad boys.

  “Hey,” he returned, voice bored, face locked down as before.

  Her head tilted, seductive smile freezing a second. “Hi,” she repeated. She leaned in close, her hand came down off the doorframe, and she reached for him –

  Her nostrils flared. “You didn’t shower.” Her eyes flooded with accusation, distaste, disapproval.

  He grinned, and he knew it was nasty. “Nah. I’m all dead grass, motor oil, and sweat right now, baby doll. Come here and take a good whiff.”

  Her eyes narrowed. “I told you–”

  “And I’m telling you that you gotta get your fancy ass in gear if you’re going out with me tonight. Otherwise, see ya around.”

  She glared at him, eyes shooting sparks, and her lips worked like she was forming insults to throw at him. But ultimately, she slammed her apartment door behind her and set off toward the elevator at his side.

  “You stink,” she said, and her voice was full of leashed excitement.

  So she was one of those, the big bad bitch who secretly wanted to be dominated. Ugh.

  “You like it, don’t you?” he accused. He faced her as they stepped onto the elevator, and the energy shimmering off of her danced across his skin like electric currents. “You wanna act like a guy’s supposed to dress nice and act right and take you to expensive dinners and shit. But really…” The doors slid shut on them and he leaned into her face, saw the spark of arousal in her eyes, watched her dampen her lips. Her breasts heaved as she sucked in a breath. “Really,” he said softly, “you just wanna be put up against a wall and have your brains fucked out. You’re nothing but a bitch in heat.”

  Her hand hovered over the emergency stop button. “I ought to hit you for that,” she said through her teeth, but her expression gave her away; she was thrilled.

  “But you won’t,” he said smugly. “’Cause tonight, I’m gonna give you the real biker experience, and you can’t fucking wait for it. Your panties are already damp, aren’t they?”

  She licked her lips again. “I’m not wearing any.”

  ~*~

  Walsh had never brought a woman to the clubhouse before. It didn’t matter that he was almost forty, that the woman in question was his old lady, and that no one was going to razz him about it – he was nervous as a kid on the way to prom.

  “So this is the clubhouse,” he said, though that had to be self-explanatory.

  It was a small party, but some of the New York guys were still in town, so the lights were strung up beneath the pavilion and the music was thumping.

  Beside him, Emmie had an arm looped through his, but didn’t seem frightened. Just curious. A little tired maybe, after a long day’s work.

  “You’ve met all the local guys,” he told her. “But there’s some from out of town.”

  “Okay.”

  “And there’s probably some stuff going on in there. Smoking. Lots of drinking. There might be a stripper. And the club girls will be there, for sure.”

  Emmie turned a laughing look up to him. “Are you worried I’m going to freak out?”

  He shrugged. “No.”

  She laughed. “I’ve made it this far. Do you think a little smoke and tit show is going to send me running?”

  “You never know.” Because much less offensive things had sent others running.

  She leaned in closer, propped her chin on his shoulder. “Well, it’s not.”

  He’d have to trust her on that, because there was no going back.

  ~*~

  “You’re stuck in your head again tonight.” Jasmine was sitting so close, his arm wedged against her breasts, that he felt the slick slide of her freshly glossed lips against his ear.

  “Just tired.” He took a long swig of his beer and wished it was something harder.

  Or maybe red wine.

  Fuck him.

  “You’re tired a lot lately.” True concern in her voice, in her touch, as she reached to push a stray piece of his hair back. “Something on your mind? Someone?”

  They were sitting on a couch against the wall, as the party rocked around them. Blaring music, clink of pool balls, barks of laughter. No one was paying them any attention.

  He turned his head and saw the concern in her face.

  She’d spent hours on her hair and makeup: the big barrel curls, the exact black eyeliner and shadow, the glistening sheen of her lips.

  “I don’t tell you how beautiful you are enough,” Tango said quietly. “You are, you know? Absolutely gorgeous.”

  She smiled and batted her lashes. “Well thanks for noticing, baby.” Then grew serious again. “But I’m worried about you. I don’t see you much anymore.”

  Regret speared through him. “I’m sorry.”

  She pressed in closer, so their lips were almost touching. “Do you still like girls?” she whispered.

  “I always liked girls. Always will.” And that was the truth. He’d wanted women from the beginning, to know the secrets hidden beneath their clothes and taste their impossibly soft skin, but life had dealt him a different hand, and he’d spent those developmental teenage years having his sexuality explored for him, by force most times. He’d been conditioned, until pain and pleasure became the same thing, and attraction something that was only about his cock and the tangling of bodies, and nothing emotional.

  There had been times, though, even during the dark days, when a man would bring his girlfriend into the club with him. Times when both of them had wanted to use him.

  And then there had been Jazz, and the club girls, and he’d been awkward and fumbling at first, because he hadn’t known what to do with his muddled proclivities.

  Jasmine’s hand landed in his lap; she cupped his cock through his jeans. “I miss you when you’re not around, you know.”

  “I know.”

  She grinned. “And you never did ask Aidan, did you? You promised me.” She pretended to pout, and smiled again. “Cheer me up, and maybe it’ll cheer you up, too.”

  Tango glanced across the room to where Aidan stood with his furious-faced, model-looking rich girl. “I think he’s got his hands full tonight.”

  Jazz snorted. “She’s pretty, I’ll give her that. But you can smell the crazy bitch on her from all the way over here.”

  He laughed and it felt good; God knew when the last time had been.

  Jasmine’s hand tightened on him. “That’s what I like to hear.” She reached for the button of his jeans.

  He moved to stop her, and she swatted his hand away. “Jazz, not in front of everyone…”

  “Relax, baby,” she said as she reached inside his jeans. “No one’s watching.”

  But they were there, though. In the same room, just feet away, as her fingers curled around his cock and gave it a firm tug.

  The laughter died away in his chest, the smile sliding off his face. He pressed his boot heels into the floor and lifted his hips because his body wanted her touch, any touch, all touches.

  But he was still nothing but an exhibition, a cock that needed stroking, and not much of a man at all.

  It was killing him. Slowly, since the beginning, an acid eating away at every foundation.

  It was only a matter of time before there was nothing left.

  ~*~

  “I’ve never seen Walsh with a chick!” the brunette with the huge breasts and the excessive eye makeup said, leaning in closer. Chanel, she’d said her name was, like the perfume.

  Emmie hadn’t quite known what Walsh meant by “club girls,” but when this woman had plunked down beside her, she’d learned. These were groupi
es, who performed menial tasks because they were hooked on bikers.

  “He doesn’t ever give us the time of day,” Chanel went on, waving her hand like she couldn’t believe Walsh would have done such a thing. She grinned at Emmie. “But he’s married! Oh my God. I totally don’t believe it.”

  “Yeah…um…we’re married. So yeah.” She sipped her wine to fill her vocabulary void. She wouldn’t say that she was spooked, and she for sure could handle the atmosphere, but she would admit to being a touch overwhelmed. The music was louder than she’d thought, the jostling bikers rowdier, and there was in fact a stripper, though she appeared to be one of the regular groupies, because RJ reached up, grabbed one of her nipple tassels and pulled her down into his lap, at which point she squealed in delight and shoved her tongue in his mouth.

  The wine was at least decent. Walsh had headed for the bar to get her a second glass, and that’s when Chanel had swooped in.

  Across the coffee table, Briscoe said, “Girl, don’t be bothering his old lady. She don’t wanna talk to you.”

  “She does too,” Chanel insisted, hands going on her hips, chest thrusting forward.

  “No, she doesn’t,” a female voice said, and Maggie Teague appeared, standing on the other side of the groupie, somehow making a plaid shirt, jeans, and boots look like Fashion Week’s finest. “Go see what the beer situation is, Chanel. I’ll keep the new Mrs. Walsh company.”

  The groupie hustled to obey with a fast “yes, ma’am.”

  As the queen sat beside her, Emmie didn’t know who she would have rather been subjected to. Chantel was…well, it wasn’t nice what she was thinking. But there was no agenda there. No cunning.

  “How’s it going?” Maggie asked. Light. Casual.

  Emmie stepped carefully regardless. “Good.”

  “Ever been to anything like this?” She gestured to the party with her beer bottle.

  “Not since high school. There were topless girls then, too, but they weren’t getting paid with anything besides gonorrhea.”

  Maggie snorted. “RJ, meanwhile, gives a girl such a great compensation package.”